the art of world domination
by liliths
Summary: "oh, ms. reyna, it was a pleasure, and we had the best of times. but in the end, why did you leave? we were going to dominate the world together, remember?" –AU nico/reyna friendship with a side of angst, for flavia. rated for death.


**Happy birthday, Flavia; you're perfect. I know I'm late, so please forgive me. AU Reyna/Nico friendship with intentional verb tense shift because I can. Skimmed over this quickly, so apologies for careless mistakes. Word count: 2,393.**

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the art of world domination

-::-

This started out as a story of love, about how even in war; there would be comfort for those who sought it. Instead, this turned out to be a story of two broken souls who became siblings for each other.

-::-

No one saw it coming. It comes like a plot twist thrown carelessly into the middle of a page, without any action leading up to it. She calls him in one day to her praetor house and asks him to describe the Underworld to her.

"Why," he asks. "Why?" Why would _Reyna,_ of all people, ask him what the _Underworld_ was like?

She only clucks her tongue softly and asks him to describe it again. It's the equivalence of snapping at him to not question her orders, but it is somehow more powerful and persuading when she clucks her tongue and stares with unblinking eyes. The questions come up against an invisible dam inside his mouth, and he promptly begins to describe the Asphodel Fields.

When he finishes, her eyes are closed. "Which part of that place do you think I'll go to when I die?" she asks him quietly, rubbing her bony fingers against her temple and peering curiously into his eyes.

The question catches him off guard along with the way his superior said "that place," and it must've shown on his face because Reyna quickly glances down and dismisses him with a wave of her hand.

On the way out, he turns back and casts a worried glance at the tired girl sitting in her praetor chair. Her form is usually straight and regal, her authority filling the chair with ease. Today? The high-backed chair towers over her bent form.

"Reyna…" he begins.

She glances up at the sound of her name.

"Are you feeling okay?"

She gives him a small smile and gestures for him to leave once again. This time, he obeys.

-::-

_Bianca would've cared. Bianca wouldn't have failed me. Bianca wouldn't have left me alone like this. Bianca would've _cared.

Screams pierced their way through Nico's head as tears streamed down his face. He rubbed the heel of his hand across his face to wipe away the salty residue forming around his eyes. He took a deep breath and rocked himself back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, a soothing motion for the broken boy.

_Bianca wouldn't have failed._

"_Shut up!"_ he screamed into the silent night air, a bellow so loud birds took flight into the pitch darkness. He was going insane, but he didn't care. At least insanity would blunt the pain.

Bianca's death wasn't why Nico spent countless hours wiping tears away from his eyes, not even aware they were forming beforehand_._ They both knew from the beginning they were both going to die painful; the question was which one of them was going to die first, which one would leave the other behind in the dust to fend for themselves, which one was going to be _alone_.

Nico di Angelo didn't just lose his sister.

Nico di Angelo lost someone who understood.

-::-

He walks past the praetor houses one night after dinner to the sound of argument. Nico knows it is rude to eavesdrop, but he still crouches down low and scampers behind the rosemary bushes to listen from an open window.

"Perseus Jackson," Reyna's voice spits with fury that would make any living being crawl away in sheer terror. "This decision is mine."

A frustrating reply comes from Percy. "At least take some time off."

Nico hears a scoff. "If you think I'm going to die in a hospital bed and not attending to my duties, Percy, you should check yourself in instead." She continues in a softer voice, "You shouldn't worry about me, Percy; I'm really fine. I'll check myself in when I feel like I can't handle it."

"Which is when you're lying on the ground and not breathing, right?" he replies.

"Of course."

"Thought so."

"I really appreciate you visiting, but I'm fine on my own."

_No,_ Nico thinks. _You're not._

-::-

He met a girl on the road once, a little Hispanic girl named Emilia, her hair still in pigtails and a glorious sort of wonder in her young eyes. She knew what it was like to be him, and they camped around border between America and Mexico for weeks, both taking turns to tend to the fire and provide the food. Hardly any words were exchanged, and Emilia never talked, but then again why do they even need to sing their songs when their eyes said everything?

Nico often looked across the border in wonder, to daydream about what it would be like to live in another country where there were no gods and no higher power except in your imagination. He thought like that a lot, what if there was a God, what if there was a Jesus, what if other cultures had the same thing? What if the solution was to simply run away to another country?

And then he would look down at poor, bony Emilia and the thoughts were snuffed out in his head. No way. If Mexico was so harsh, a girl who couldn't have been older than four would run away, America was just fine.

He woke up one night to hear her scream, a loud and shrill sound ringing about the desert night. Emilia cried out a lot in her sleep, nightmares can haunt anyone, not just demigods. He hugged her and whispered stories into her ear, let dreams enter her mind like other little girls.

But this scream was different.

This scene was different.

Nico found himself hugging a limp body stained with blood as his sword fell into the sand with a dull clunk.

"Emilia, it's okay. I'm here," he choked out as her blood stained his shirt, getting the words out with trouble. There was a furball in his throat and a pounding in his ears, topped with the ridiculous pain behind his skull.

There were tears in her eyes, and she pointed a shaky finger at him and looked questioningly. Nico understood.

"My name's Nico, Emilia," he said with the brightest smile he could muster.

He saw her mouth move to form the word, with careful enunciation that was incredible for her age. And with a little smile on her face, Emilia said the first and last words Nico heard come from her mouth.

"Nico."

He learned three things from Emilia: One, everyone died, and he ended up losing everyone who understood or cared, one way or another. Two, he knew what it felt like to be Bianca, with a little sibling to look after, with someone to care for and to be responsible for, with the weight of the world on your shoulders.

Four, how, in spite of all that, he could still smile.

-::-

"And they say it's inoperable?"

"Yes."

"You sure?"

"Yes."

"Positive?"

"Yes."

"What about chemotherapy?"

"Nico, we've been through this. I'm a dead woman. Let's have some respect for the dead and the dying." Reyna sits up and rubs her temple wearily, indicating her tumor wasn't getting any better.

"You could pray to the gods. They could help, you know?"

She opens her eyes and looks up at him with a mixture of laughter and exasperation, her fingers stopping their circular motion. "The gods are never there, they've never been–at least not for me. There has never been a higher power in my life." She goes back to rubbing, squeezing her eyes shut.

Nico sighs with frustration. "Why won't you even try? Don't you know how many people will feel terrible if you just go without letting them try?"

"It's not a matter of trying, Nico, it's about _will._" She snaps when she says the last word. And she looks up at him for real this time, not just conveying some message through her dark eyes, but she truly _looks _into his eyes. He holds her gaze for a while, and he finally realizes.

_Reyna doesn't want to survive this._

"We're done." The steely edge returns to her voice, and she gestures for him to leave.

As he walks away from the _principia,_ a tear rolls down his cheek. Why does everyone who understands him have to leave, one way or another? Why was he the one who outlived everyone else, why was he the one carrying the survivor's guilt with him at all times? _Why _was he so _cursed?_

A little voice returns to his head, the same one who chanted to him when Bianca died. _Why do you break everything you touch? _

_Shut up._

-::-

When Nico was younger, Bianca talked to him, played little games with him. They'd talk for ages, their imagination sprouting absurd ideas. His favorite was the topic of world domination.

"We should hire spies to kill people who don't like," he said, using little finger guns and making gunshot noises. He pointed one at a big and bossy girl in his classes and made a "pew" noise.

Bianca giggled and made Nico lower his finger guns. "We have to be subtle about it though. And then we can suddenly declare ourselves the new leaders. I would be everyone's superior, and everyone would listen to me."

"You're not the boss of me!"

"Says who?"

"Says me!"

"Nuh-uh! You're younger than me."

"So? I'm still braver and better!"

It was a glorious fantasy indeed, but like all fantasies, this one burst like a bubble. Nico watched it pop when he heard news of his sister's death. He remembered being in a wonderland in his mind, a magnificent dream world with green hills and tall trees. And then he remembered it shattering like glass, mystified by the popping bubble of his fantasy.

-::-

He spends a lot of time with the praetor now, talking about the Underworld when she wants to hear, talking about everyday things and eating jellybeans when she's in a good mood. Slowly but surely, they become friends–best friends.

Nico knows she will pop like every other bubble, fade away into a shower of soap and disappear into the background. He knows everything is temporary, but he wants to hang on to something worth remembering. That's worth the heartbreak, right?

However, with the increasing visits he pays to Reyna, he notices her deterioration. There were times where she would look around the room, her gaze brushing past him and chasing invisible butterflies. Sometimes, she would curl up into a ball and moan in pain, clutching her head. Sometimes, she would chase him out of her praetor house or out of the principia. He keeps these incidents to himself for her sake, and he knows she appreciates it.

Nico decides to check her into the hospital in New Rome at long last. She deserves a warrior's death, and whoever said that dying in a hospital battlefield while fighting cancer was not just as honorable as dying in the midst of war was wrong. Strangely, she doesn't object.

The next day, she questions him, eyes drifting around the hospital room wearily. "Why am I here, Nico?"

"Um, because you're sick."

Reyna sighs with discontent. "It's a bit too white for my liking."

Nico smiles because even dying, Reyna was still somehow and miraculously _Reyna_.

When he's alone, he would let an occasional tear fall because he's suffered _so much,_ and he's so _sick_ of it. He's so _sick_ of outliving everyone who understands him, to be left behind while others moved on. He's feeling desolation so great, he thinks he's going to die himself. And maybe that's better than getting left behind with new pain everyday, new wounds with salt being poured on them. Who _knows_?

-::-

She dies later that week in her sleep, and he's internally screaming. He's a porcelain doll with cracks and this time, he simply _breaks._ Being a son of Hades doesn't mean you're emotionless.

Nico refuses to wear a black suit to her funeral because black is such an empty color, and he doesn't need to be surrounded by mourners who didn't even understand her to begin with. They were just honoring her memory and saying their farewells. If you truly understood Reyna, you would be acting like she's still alive, still referring to her in the present tense.

Instead, he wears gray. She said–says–it looked good on him once.

He also refuses to speak at her funeral because between the two of them, the only words exchanged are unimportant bits of information. Nico and Reyna communicate with their eyes and their body language alone. And even without any eye contact, they understood each other.

In other words, they knew what _pain _was like.

To his immense surprise, Hylla comes up to him at the funeral and embraces him in a bear hug. "Thank you for taking care of my little sister," she whispers into his ear before pulling away.

"She was my sister, too," he wants to say, but his tongue feels too heavy to get the words out.

When the coffin is finally lowered, he waves at it with a faint smile, and people stare, but at least they respect his decision. After all, he knew her best.

Nico di Angelo doesn't realize he's crying until a tear lands on the back of his hand.

-::-

"_Oh, Ms. Reyna, it was a pleasure, and we had the _best _of times. But in the end, why did you leave? We were going to dominate the world together, remember?"_

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**Flavia, I'm so sorry for my writing, but happy birthday nonetheless. I didn't have time to look over this, so please excuse the errors.**


End file.
